“Cable news knows that Americans can’t comprehend that it’s cold outside from abstract temperatures or ‘seasons,” Colbert joked on “The Colbert Report” on Wednesday. “That’s why they don’t just tell, they show using the latest meteorological technology ripped straight from YouTube, the Doppler Cup of Water 9000.”

But one creative reporter, CBS Minnesota’s Rachel Slavik, realized turning water into snow still may not be enough to answer the age-old question, “How cold is it outside?” So instead, she took meteorological technology to the next level by using a frozen banana to hammer a nail into a block of wood.

Tune in tomorrow when reporters start making their breath look like cigarette smoke.